How Do You Know Its Your God?

[onetimeposter]

The reason I choose to place my faith in the Catholic Church is that it is plausable, reasonable and consistent (in my estimation). Could I be wrong? Of course. But considering the evidence and the fact that I have to make my decision, I choose to place by faith in the Church.

But if you were born into a Jewish family, it almost certain that you would still be waiting for the Messiah to come.

The religion we follow has a lot to do with the happenstance of where we are born and the family we are born into.

What is plausible to you, is because it is what you know. Just as Judaism, Islam, Scientology is reasonable to their followers.

How reasonable is it to a non believer that we are to eat the flesh of the son of God?

To the casual observer, Christianity may seem to be filled with inconsistencies. I’m not saying it is, I’m talking about how others may observe your Faith.

 

[Newbie2]

Now this is a good post. After someone comes up with a good response to me in another thread about proving God exists, I was going to ask this very question of them.

Its easy to provide arguments about God existing, but how do you know we haven’t got it wrong and its really the Muslims or Buddhists that have it right?

Great thread.

I look at it that perhaps the Buddhists, etc. see the same God, only through a different perspective. Taking a monotheistic viewpoint, that would seem to be a valid answer.

I guess that’s why they call it faith.

 

[santodomingo]

I’m not sure there is an answer. Each and every believer regardless of their particular faith tradition believes that his/her religious books, teachers etc provide ample proof that this is the true faith. I’m not so sure it matters a great deal.
.

WHAT???!!! This is relativism, pure and simple. Of course it MATTERS!! Do you think Jesus would approve of us saying that all faiths are equally valid and there´s no way of distinguishing between true religion and man-made religion? Would he have bothered dying on the cross for us if it were “optional”?

 

[santodomingo]

We are but mortal humans with very limited understandings of such things. We are probably best off simply aligning ourselves with the faith tradition that we most resonate with. Surely if God guides us all through his Spirit, then we are not led astray.

Luther thought exactly the same when he broke off from the Catholic Church. He was guided by his own (mistaken) understanding. The same can be said for virtually every heresy throughout Church history, right down to today´s New-Age fads. Subjectivism will lead us to error. That is precisely why Jesus gave us the Church; to lead us in the Truth, with ONE head (the pope) and ONE authority.

I thought this was a catholic forum!! I haven´t read much of a defense of Catholic teaching yet in this thread!

 

[santodomingo]

Hey, it ´s also ocurred to me that the CC has scientifically demonstrated miracles. There is NO OTHER FAITH in the world that can make this claim. They all talk about miracles, and have plenty of mythology and magic, but none can point to real, solid miracles.

The CC can point to literally thousands, with countless witnesses, doctors and experts who will back them up. Uncureable diseases cured, consecrated Hosts that turn to flesh and remain fresh after 1000 years (Lanciano), the miracle of the sun at Fatima, 1917, etc. God confirms His Church as the deposit of the one true faith through these miracles. They are signs to all those who doubt.

Check them out!! Plenty of info in:
www.therealpresence.org

 

[Benadam]

I thought this was a catholic forum!! I haven´t read much of a defense of Catholic teaching yet in this thread!

Point taken. The experience of human life divinized through the Sacraments of the Catholic Church is the most obvious answer for Catholics.

 

[Sarpedon]

But if you were born into a Jewish family, it almost certain that you would still be waiting for the Messiah to come.

The religion we follow has a lot to do with the happenstance of where we are born and the family we are born into.

For some people, yes. Others examine and analyze both their birth religion and other religions to try and determine the truth. I would like to think I fall in the second category.

What is plausible to you, is because it is what you know. Just as Judaism, Islam, Scientology is reasonable to their followers.

Reason in of itself is objective, and I try to remain as free of subjective influences as possible. If I have slipped and allowed subjective influence, please tell me.

How reasonable is it to a non believer that we are to eat the flesh of the son of God?

There is nothing contrary to reason in God giving Himself as spiritual nourishment to us, in a physical sense. This does not mean that it is true, but it is not contradictory or excessively implausable (if you disagree, please explain). There is also nothing contrary to reason in many beliefs of other faiths, such as God not being a Trinity, Arabic being a sacred language, the existence of genies, etc.

To the casual observer, Christianity may seem to be filled with inconsistencies. I’m not saying it is, I’m talking about how others may observe your Faith.

That’s why we discuss it.

 

[Sarpedon]

Hinduism-

The law of non-contradiction dos not hold. God can both exist and not exist at the same time. Hinduism can be both true and false at the same time. This essentially renders all logic, ordered thinking, and truth false.

Buddhism-

We are reborn through reincarnation. We can escape this cycle by quenching all desires and reaching Nirvana. This results is spiritual euthanasia, where we no longer desire anything, even existence. This is essentially spiritual death. This is what we should all strive for.

This doesn’t address the question of why we exist in the first place or why this system is in place. There is no reason for this system to exist. If God created it (Buddhism is essentially agnostic), then why? If our purpose in life is to quench all desires and basically return to a state of near non-existence, then why were we made to exist and have desires in the first place?

Islam-

Good and evil both proceed from the will of Allah. This means that Allah wills evil. If this is true, then Allah is not all good. If he is not all good, then why did he create the world? (Christians attribute it to His goodness). If Allah can be both good and bad, then the nature of Allah can change. This contradicts the idea of Divine Immutability. (I can’t go into the proof for this now, but it’s on newadvent.org under “The nature and attributes of God”)

Some of these things seem contrary to reason, in my estimation. Others seem simply implausable and unlikely, so I am not willing to place my faith in them. IMHO Catholicism provides the most rationally consistent and plausable explanation.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

First, let me thank everyone for the excellent responses. I think Spirit Meadow comes cloese to expressing my feelings on this subject. The idea that we got with what feels right to us which was mentioned by a few of you and I think this has real merit. I also agree that the basic teachings on loving your neighbor, etc. do indeed appear in religions and spiritiual traditions the world over - which should tell something (like coexistance is a good idea and we should pursue it). It might also speak towards objective truth - one that doesn’t find it’s home in any one traiditon but that resonates with manking in general. The Golden Rule, for example. It also makes me wonder how such a simple teaching got so complicated.

I think it was Thich Nhat Han who wrote a book on the parallels between Christianity and Buddhism. I have another little book that goes through all the world’s religions and shows how each has some form of the Golden rule as part of its sacred teaching. I think that some concepts of living are simply inately human.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

But if you were born into a Jewish family, it almost certain that you would still be waiting for the Messiah to come.

The religion we follow has a lot to do with the happenstance of where we are born and the family we are born into.

What is plausible to you, is because it is what you know. Just as Judaism, Islam, Scientology is reasonable to their followers.

How reasonable is it to a non believer that we are to eat the flesh of the son of God?

To the casual observer, Christianity may seem to be filled with inconsistencies. I’m not saying it is, I’m talking about how others may observe your Faith.

Boy do I agree with you. I think we tend to find normal and reasonable the faith we are most surrounded by. A friend sent me a copy of the Urantia Book. After a few pages, I remarked to my husband that it was awfully strange with all its references to superuniverses and so on. He suggested I try to approach it in the same way that I might approach christianity if I was suddenly sent a bible and had never experienced anything about Christianity. It definitely helped, and persuades me of the correctness of your claim.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

WHAT???!!! This is relativism, pure and simple. Of course it MATTERS!! Do you think Jesus would approve of us saying that all faiths are equally valid and there´s no way of distinguishing between true religion and man-made religion? Would he have bothered dying on the cross for us if it were “optional”?

Let’s not start throwing around relativism. You cannot prove by any means that judeo-christian principles are correct to the exclusion of all others. you can believe they are at best. you can be totally intellectually sure of it, but you cannot prove it. Do you not think that Shintoists and Hindus feel the same way about their faith? I did not make any reference to anyting being optional. I suggested that a good heart, sincerely believing in God in whatever manner one deems correct is the most we can ask of anyone. I leave the rest up to God. I certainly did not say that all faiths are equally valid. I would not agree to that at all. And certainly to the individual, one usually stands far about the others.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

Luther thought exactly the same when he broke off from the Catholic Church. He was guided by his own (mistaken) understanding. The same can be said for virtually every heresy throughout Church history, right down to today´s New-Age fads. Subjectivism will lead us to error. That is precisely why Jesus gave us the Church; to lead us in the Truth, with ONE head (the pope) and ONE authority.

I thought this was a catholic forum!! I haven´t read much of a defense of Catholic teaching yet in this thread!

I think largely you misunderstand the question posited. Luther was consumed by fear that nothing he could do would grant him salvation. He became obsessed with the concept of predestination. He was quite clearly in my mind mad. He finally concluded (to his unending self-protection) that the mere questioning of his own salvation meant he was one of the elect. He did not make any claim that it made no difference what one chose as faith.

You are not differentiating between what you believe and what can be actually know as pure fact. The OP, unless I am mistaken, was referring to the latter. One cannot know, one believes. I can believe Catholicism is more correct than any other, but I do not know that to be a fact. I trust that God sorts this stuff out in a better way than I can, and find it sufficient to do my best and honor those who do their best, regardless of their faith choices.

 

[Sarpedon]

Boy do I agree with you. I think we tend to find normal and reasonable the faith we are most surrounded by. .

I think the key word here is “tend”. Even if it is true that people generally think that the faith they are most exposed to is the most reasonable, this doesn’t really address whether it is possible to objectively analyze all world religions and determine the superior one.

 

[santodomingo]

You are not differentiating between what you believe and what can be actually know as pure fact. The OP, unless I am mistaken, was referring to the latter. One cannot know, one believes. I can believe Catholicism is more correct than any other, but I do not know that to be a fact. I trust that God sorts this stuff out in a better way than I can, and find it sufficient to do my best and honor those who do their best, regardless of their faith choices.

I was trying to show how persistently relying on one´s own understanding, refusing to trust God, leads to error. A good rule of thumb is “more observation and less judgement” Of course, we have to try to examine the facts first, but there is a moment when we have to trust. That´s what faith means.

Example of “pure fact”: Fact 1. On October 13, 1917 some 50.000 people gathered at fatima to witness the miracle that had been profecied by the three children.
Fact2 All the witnesses coincide in describing the sun seeming to fall from the sky
Fact 3 Before this “miracle” began it had been raining heavily and everyone was soaking wet. Afterwards all the witnesses claim they were completely dry and all the puddles had dried up instantly.
Fact 4 Several scoffers had also come to ridicule the miracle, including a journalist from the anti-clerical newspaper “O Seculo”. The next day this journalist, far from debunking the miracle, published an article describing in detail the miraculous events.

Step of faith: After examining this facts, which anyone who wants to take the time can verify (they are very well documented), a reasonable person can decide to BELIEVE that the Virgin Mary appeared, as the three shepherd children claimed. This is an enirely rational conclusion, and yet it is much more than rational. It is a step of faith.

Hope that clarifies my view of things and perhaps helps someone.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

I think the key word here is “tend”. Even if it is true that people generally think that the faith they are most exposed to is the most reasonable, this doesn’t really address whether it is possible to objectively analyze all world religions and determine the superior one.

I agree with you on this as well. I think anyone can look at all the possibilites, and decide which one is superior, but I would argue that it is objective only to that individual. If it were objectively provable, then by now there would be agreement on what that one was. There is not, in fact there is not even a movement in any particular direction as far as I can see.

this should come as no surprise. The reason it is called faith is for a reason. It is not a thing subject to objective verifiable fact upon which all rational people would have to agree. It is a matter of belief, although to any individual it may amount to perfect truth, perfectly intellectually arrived at.

That is why all and I do mean ALL discussions between believers and atheists are doomed to failure. Neither position is provable, albeit the atheist at least has no burden of proving a negative.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

I was trying to show how persistently relying on one´s own understanding, refusing to trust God, leads to error. A good rule of thumb is “more observation and less judgement” Of course, we have to try to examine the facts first, but there is a moment when we have to trust. That´s what faith means.

Example of “pure fact”: Fact 1. On October 13, 1917 some 50.000 people gathered at fatima to witness the miracle that had been profecied by the three children.
Fact2 All the witnesses coincide in describing the sun seeming to fall from the sky
Fact 3 Before this “miracle” began it had been raining heavily and everyone was soaking wet. Afterwards all the witnesses claim they were completely dry and all the puddles had dried up instantly.
Fact 4 Several scoffers had also come to ridicule the miracle, including a journalist from the anti-clerical newspaper “O Seculo”. The next day this journalist, far from debunking the miracle, published an article describing in detail the miraculous events.

Step of faith: After examining this facts, which anyone who wants to take the time can verify (they are very well documented), a reasonable person can decide to BELIEVE that the Virgin Mary appeared, as the three shepherd children claimed. This is an enirely rational conclusion, and yet it is much more than rational. It is a step of faith.

Hope that clarifies my view of things and perhaps helps someone.

Many people would claim that they have seen or experienced miracles. To the degree that they are not explained by some natural means, they remain miracles. However, that in no way proves the efficacy of any faith. you cannot disprove other unexplained supernatural events that may be claimed by other faiths. The reason it is called faith is for a reason. It’s not meant to be a intellectual pursuit that results in an answer that is objectively final. If it were, everyone would be the same “faith”.

I know what you believe. It happens to be what I believe. That changes nothing about its proof as being factually true.

 

[Sarpedon]

That is why all and I do mean ALL discussions between believers and atheists are doomed to failure. Neither position is provable, albeit the atheist at least has no burden of proving a negative.

But wouldn’t you agree that such discussions can sometimes convince the other party to change their position?

 

[BlaineTog]

But wouldn’t you agree that such discussions can sometimes convince the other party to change their position?

Sometimes, but rarely, very rarely, and probably not by logic alone.

 

[eigerhar]

There are very strong arguments for catholic faith that no intelligent man can deny:

The wonders of Jesus and first of all his resurrection.
This wonders are even confirmed by the ennemies (Quoran, babylonic Talmud).

All the Apostels and Martyrs have confirmed those miracles and did own ones.

Still today there are:
br.youtube.com/watch?v=p4x4qchBBGg
(look all the followings)

Only the Son of God has scientifically affirmed miracles.

 

[Genesis315]

I’ve read the “prove God exists” stuff and wanted to tackle a different question. I have no problem believing that there is a “God”, by which I mean a Supreme Being, Creator of the Universe type power. So that is something we can agree on. But how do we know that this Great Spirit is the Judeo Christian God? This is something I was raised with and never thought I’d question, but, alas, I now do. Please feel free to disucss, whatever your belief. I’d like to read what folks have to say.

If we are talking about a transcendant, non-contingent being, there can only be one by its very essence. That’s why we say Jews, Muslims, and other monotheists (like those St. Paul discusses in Acts 12) worship the same God. Other gods (like Zeus, Thor, etc.) had contingent essences and also do not exist. The God worshipped by us is non-contingent and its very essence necessitates its existence.

Now, that doesn’t mean all they profess about God is true.